Tweet
NFL'S BEST COACHES 2021
Patrick Daugherty ranks and evaluates all 32 of the NFL's coaches, including this year's seven new hires.
MORE
1. Bill Belichick, Patriots
Career Record: 280-136 (.673)
With The Patriots Since: 2000
Last Year’s Ranking: 1
Bill Belichick is a black box. For as expansive as he can be on matters of NFL history or special teams strategy, he won’t provide a window into the thought process that allowed Tom Brady to depart in free agency. Was 2020’s 7-9 record — the Patriots’ first losing season since 2000 — considered a painful necessity all along? Or was it a rare piece of humble pie for a genius who thought he could immediately put his co-icon behind him? Whatever it was, it was in keeping with one of Belichick’s most famous practices: It’s better to be one year too early instead of one year too late. In this case, Belichick’s too early was someone else’s Super Bowl championship. Probably not the result he expected, but it was the process he was always going to follow. Belichick was wrong, as he often is. His gift remains being the least wrong in a business where mistakes are a part of daily life.
Career Record: 280-136 (.673)
With The Patriots Since: 2000
Last Year’s Ranking: 1
Bill Belichick is a black box. For as expansive as he can be on matters of NFL history or special teams strategy, he won’t provide a window into the thought process that allowed Tom Brady to depart in free agency. Was 2020’s 7-9 record — the Patriots’ first losing season since 2000 — considered a painful necessity all along? Or was it a rare piece of humble pie for a genius who thought he could immediately put his co-icon behind him? Whatever it was, it was in keeping with one of Belichick’s most famous practices: It’s better to be one year too early instead of one year too late. In this case, Belichick’s too early was someone else’s Super Bowl championship. Probably not the result he expected, but it was the process he was always going to follow. Belichick was wrong, as he often is. His gift remains being the least wrong in a business where mistakes are a part of daily life.
Kevin Stefanski is too low. He should be a lot higher
Matt LaFleur and Matt Nagy, should be lower.
New Hires (In Alphabetical Order)
Dan Campbell, Lions
Career Record: 5-7 (.417)
One way to know you’ve made an interesting hire? One of his suggested Google searches is “kneecaps.” By now you know all about The Quote. Dan Campbell is here to take your kneecaps, etc. Taking Campbell at face value, he is throwing the modern football car into reverse. Smash-mouth defense, running the ball, etc. If you dig a little deeper, there was something new age-y in his initial comments. “I'm a big mind-over-matter person and a lot of you are going to think I'm a kook a little bit here, but I do believe you can will things to happen in some regard,” Campbell said. "If you're a really positive thinker, I think positive things can happen to you and those around you. … They feel your energy." Campbell, who was prone to these sorts of asides during his long-forgotten tenure as Dolphins interim coach, stayed player-friendly with his hires, stocking his staff with one recently retired NFLer after another. We laugh, but the tone certainly needed changing in Detroit, especially after the ludicrously pompous Matt Patricia era. At worst for the Lions, Campbell is a readymade fall guy for yet another rebuild. The best-case scenario is that he puts a modern spin on football’s oldest clichés of toughness and determination, shaking up an organization in dire need of being stirred.
Dan Campbell, Lions
Career Record: 5-7 (.417)
One way to know you’ve made an interesting hire? One of his suggested Google searches is “kneecaps.” By now you know all about The Quote. Dan Campbell is here to take your kneecaps, etc. Taking Campbell at face value, he is throwing the modern football car into reverse. Smash-mouth defense, running the ball, etc. If you dig a little deeper, there was something new age-y in his initial comments. “I'm a big mind-over-matter person and a lot of you are going to think I'm a kook a little bit here, but I do believe you can will things to happen in some regard,” Campbell said. "If you're a really positive thinker, I think positive things can happen to you and those around you. … They feel your energy." Campbell, who was prone to these sorts of asides during his long-forgotten tenure as Dolphins interim coach, stayed player-friendly with his hires, stocking his staff with one recently retired NFLer after another. We laugh, but the tone certainly needed changing in Detroit, especially after the ludicrously pompous Matt Patricia era. At worst for the Lions, Campbell is a readymade fall guy for yet another rebuild. The best-case scenario is that he puts a modern spin on football’s oldest clichés of toughness and determination, shaking up an organization in dire need of being stirred.
Comment